TAPS is a survivor-run group that helps victims of sex trafficking to break free. You can reach us at https://www.facebook.com/TraffickingandProstitutionServicesOnline/ We also help family members and other loves ones to "retrieve" someone they feel is either trapped into sex work. If you are a parent - you can get help at www.swanfellowship.webs.com. This is the author's personal opinion and since written in the USA is protected under rights of free speech.

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Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Of course my luck is that the day the "light goes on" with me with respect to some of the concepts Tom was trying to raise awareness about - I learn he passed away two years ago.

So I'm writing to the survivors. My name is Jody Williams. Back in the 1980's, I was a young MENSA member who graduated high school at 15 years of age because of a high IQ. I enrolled in community college to prepare my way for the university, but I needed to get a job after my father robbed my college fund.

I got a job at a nightclub owned by the family who are part of the generational line connected to Richard Pryor of drug dealers, pimps and prostitutes . He's spoken openly about his grandmother running the brothel his mother worked in. They needed a way to launder money and this was the club I walked into looking for a job in 1979.

I was "turned out" by this family of pimps into the sex industry. However, after watching this "family" tore apart by the cocaine epidemic, I asked the head of the "family" to buy my way out safely. I'd seen what they did to those who tried to leave on their own. They agreed and I was now an "independent" in the industry.

Word spread on the streets and this is when the REAL predators came to prey upon me - the LAPD and the CIA. They were working together in what we now know as Iran Contra. The corrupt police officers who were part of flooding this country with cocaine, all while blaming the African American community for this scourge, also ran a sex trafficking ring. They supplied drugs and prostitutes to the wealthy elite of Hollywood - knowing the film industry affects the way the people of the world think. They also needed pretty prostitutes to carry the drugs from the projects into the homes and hotels of Bel Air, Beverly Hills, etc., Which is why all of us "madams" such as myself, Alex Adams, and Cheri Woods were called upon to be part of this agenda.

We all went along as we were making money. But when we were asked to supply them with women who had no "family" to ask questions about their disappearance to be sold to Saudi oil men, and drug dealers, who liked "white women" and wanted to collect them like Scarface collected white tigers - we balked. This is why you can read how all of the top madams in the country, including Sydney Biddle Barrow, the Mayflower Madam, were all arrested in 1984.

Our faces and names were spread all over the media to make sure we couldn't not only not get a 9 to 5 job outside of the sex industry, but to further scare away all of our "regulars" who didn't want to risk any of the press coming on to expose them. They confiscated all of our money and property, all while threatening us with other criminal charges. The point was to make us more "hungry" and thus more "compliant".

Movie and book contracts were offered to each of us to further ensure that "their" version of our stories were what went out to the press. I was the only one of the bunch who insisted I would not allow propaganda to go out which wasn't revealing the "whole truth" about the sex industry, and what is now been defined by the term "sex trafficking". I was then reminded I had signed a contract preventing me from speaking to the press without their consent. In other words, I was being silenced legally in the form of a book and film option contract. Clever.

Victims of this had no way out. They couldn't call the police obviously for help as they were part of the problem. Shelters weren't set up to protect us from the very systems funding their programs - who would then hand us over to them in two seconds if asked. Their funding depended upon not "rocking the boat". So I took an old warehouse I had once used as a brothel and created what I later learned was the first "safe house" for adults in this country. I say "adults" because only one for juveniles had been created in 1979 by Lois Lee. Since most of the people I saw being targeted by these predators were over 18 - we had a different issue which had to be addressed.

The next thing I know I'm being set up and arrested for supposedly "running a brothel". They gave me a $50,000 bail so the media could print what they wanted them to print and I couldn't come out and explain what was really going on by speaking for myself. When I showed there was no evidence to support this charge - they arrested my mother. When we fought her arrest - they threatened my 70 year old grandmother they knew wouldn't survive an arrest because of her age and frail health. So I gave them their pound of flesh for two years. Coming back when I was off probation in 1987 and launching the first hotline and 12 step program designed to stop criminalizing these victims to further silence and control them. We were successful. Our program "worked" not only at getting people out of the sex industry, rescuing them from sex trafficking operations, but also at coordinating the people to see the Trafficking Act of 2000 pass.

I thought we had achieved success. Sex trafficking in America was now legally recognized. Funds were going to be used to help these victims. Our program had chapters meeting in every major city of the USA generating recovery. In fact, if you look at any recognized survivor of sex trafficking in this country who went on to create their own local program to help prostitutes - they all came from our program. For the first time in history, this community was recognized as people needing help - not as "criminals" or "whores". We had achieved what Bill Wilson had when he not only created AA - but put into our consciousness alcoholism was a disease - not a crime as had been tried with Prohibition.

Jeane Palfrey was the first of us to have the black and white proof of how madams in this country were being sex trafficked not by pimps - but by our own government. She released her "Black Book" to prove not only this was real, but also to show the connection between her and Randall Tobias - the man who swooped in with the TVRA of 2003 - and "hijacked" this movement right out from under us real survivors.

Something the author of the Trafficking Act of 2000 himself, Michael Horowitz, has confirmed this movement has now been "hijacked by people seeking money and power". Which happen to be the sex traffickers themselves. Just as how in the day of Al Capone and Prohibition - the only ones being arrested were those in "competition" with the mob, which also wasn't even being acknowledged as 'real" back then either. The reason the mob wasn't being acknowledged as real was because then it would become clear the only ones being arrested were those not feeding this criminal enterprise which had it's very roots in our courts, law enforcement, politicians and the church. People who all profited by Prohibition while the alcoholic was still suffering and exploited.

Sure the grip on the alcoholic was released, and placed upon the addict. When the grip off the addict was released - now the "prostitute" became the "victim de jour" to now be simultaneously criminalized, exploited, and demonized. Something happened in 2008 - this is when I saw something happening which confused me at first. The people we had helped to exit and recover from the sex industry, whether trafficked or not, had gone out to start local programs to provide services and resources we couldn't as a 12 step program.

In 2009, I watched as one by one each one of these programs were disbanded. I watched as the founders were either murdered, framed, slandered, blackmailed, or just plain threatened right out of the field. I saw a woman with no criminal history framed and sent off to prison for five years without a fair trial who had set up the first alternative sentencing program in Nevada. They claimed it was "elder abuse" so she got no early release, no time off for good behavior, no reprieve.

While REAL survivors were being silenced, I then saw the 'catfish" phony ones coming up out of the woodwork. The Samoly Mam's, Rachel Moran's, Chong Kim, William Hilliar, Stella Marr - all completely funded by the same people who were being not only the hijacking of this movement, but further connected to the sex industry itself. Why?

For the same things which happened in Columbia in the 1990's - the inmates were now running the asylum. In the 1990's if you tried to call and report something you knew to the authorities against the drug Cartel - they had systems in place to intercept those calls. The caller then was met with either threats, or just plain whacked, depending on how much they knew or how much evidence they had against the Cartel. The courts were so afraid to step against the Cartel - "faceless justice" committees had to be set up to try and hold up some accountability against them for their crimes. Not just with respect to drug sales - but for things which have the Columbia people terrified and controlled. The Cartel not only owned the soccer teams, but even the country's pharmacies, just to give you an idea about how much power they had.

We were pushed out of the criminal justice system as an "alternative" to incarceration. If you look at the time period of the late 1980's through the mid-1990's - you do not hear one story breaking loose in the media about corruption and prostitution and/or sex trafficking. After being pushed out of the system however, we are now hearing about Joohon David Lee and now Celeste Guap. Celeste was supposedly not only being "bought" by men in police uniform, even Chiefs of Police, but further tipped off to trafficking activities so she herself could remain trapped.

Her mother was a 911 operator. I've got a nice long list now of names of people who have called our hotline because they had tried to report sex trafficking to these new, well funded, "anti-trafficking task forces". Only to be responded to the same way those in Columbia were responded to when they tried to "do the right thing" and report crimes they'd witnessed. Celeste's mother being a 911 operator shows a system in place I'd like to know how a crime can be properly reported when there's a woman there knowing her very daughter's life is at stake should things go south.

What happened to Celeste shows we've lost control. I've been trying for a few years now on behalf of many victims just like her all over the country to get them help. I'd like to know how they're supposed to stop being prostituted, when the people behind them are most of the police force, the sheriff's office, even again going up to men such as Joohon who is in Homeland Security, ICE, and the trafficking task forces? A man who walks victims right past LAX security into this country on plane tickets bought by our own government. Further, a man for who I've been told we STILL have no laws on the books to even charge this man with any crime other than "bribery" who is now driving a limo in Las Vegas as what the justice system says is "throwing the book" at him.

I've knocked on the doors of our Attorney General, Kamala Harris, as well as our prosecutor's office, who has included Jackie Lacey, and Nancy O'Malley, and the Chief of Police, Internal Affairs, even our governor's office saying I need to speak to them about what these victims are saying is happening to them, and what we're going to do to provide them with help. When I first started our program, I used to be able to put many of the victims into drug treatment where the HIPPA laws used to protect them from being found by these traffickers and drug back or worse as we saw with what happened to Jeane Palfrey.

Only to be ignored. When the situation reached the point where Celeste's story hit the media, instead of her being referred to our program who has dealt successfully with victims just like her for 30 years - the same people who refused to help now step in to say "they're handling it". Celeste was then sent to a treatment program which took a woman who was being raped for years by men in uniform that had security guards on the floor. Guards who then took a woman turning to them for help and drug her off to be charged with assault. Further given a $300,000 bail for the sole reason of silencing her to the media, as well as I'm sure doing to her what was done to me when I was arrested in the same manner in 1984 - to make sure she keeps her mouth shut about everything she knows.

A woman who if you look on her social media is clearly still being used as a prostitute. Is this by choice? I'd like to know what "choice" is it when she's being blocked from even speaking to our organization by again the very people who are supposed to be helping her such as the prosecutor's office. One who seems more interested in grandstanding for the upcoming election than in doing what is needed to help Celeste. If Nancy O'Malley's interest was in helping Celeste - she would have turned her over to our program with a 30 year track record long before now. No - she would have taken our calls three years ago when we called about her plight, and that of many women in this country right now just like her.

I have gone down the line of speaking to these people. I talked to the Attorney General's office who told me they can't do anything if the police aren't willing to put together an investigation and arrest the criminals. I went to the police who told me they can't do this when they're going to risk their lives to put together a case - only to see it not taken to court because the prosecutor's office won't file. The prosecutor's office has told me they don't see a point in filing when they know the judges are all either bought off, or too scared, to charge these criminals. The judge's tell me there's no point in going against the criminals when they know they're only going to be released early by an over-crowded correctional system which is now mostly for profit in this country.

We used to be able to get the media to put pressure on the system to "do the right thing". We last saw this happen with the Chris Butler case. No one wanted to touch the guy - until the press exposed what he was doing. THEN we saw the operation he was involved with exposed. I'm not going to say shut down - because he was just replaced with someone else. That is what "racketeering" laws are about - when the people within the system are just spokes on the wheel of a machine which keeps running no matter how many spokes are replaced.

Now we have another stack of reporters telling us they can't report on what's going on for one reason or another - either they're scared of winding up like Gary Webb did with his head shot off, or they don't want to wind up on the unemployment line only posting videos on youtube because no news agency will hire them.

Is it important? A reporter was confronted recently about why tapes concerning Donald Trump, a man running for the highest seat of power in this country, were not released sooner. The reporter honestly said it wasn't released because of the stranglehold on the media for who if he had - then not only would no one have not heard it anyway, but that he would then be completely banned from working within the media again because the company producing the segment was also the same company producing the show with Donald Trump. So yes - when this is affecting what we know about people running for President of this country then it is a "big deal" when the media is being choked.

Noam Chomsky has said "propaganda is to a democracy what a gun is to a dictator". Only we the public are the ones being fired upon here. Now I don't care how well Celeste is treated at this point - the system itself which created this situation is not being addressed. It was not being addressed when I started knocking on these doors a few years ago, when I was going to reporters telling me they're being silenced, nor is it being addressed now for the sake of all the other victims of sex trafficking, and the related corruption.

If I'm being told by every office within our legal and political system there's nothing they can do on their own because of how the other offices aren't cooperating with them for one reason or another - then what is the solution? At first I thought applying the racketeering laws might be an answer. When I turned to Kamala Harris' office and pushed on her to do this - she announced she's "running for senate" and put up her donation site. Okay that's not a solution.

Then I thought maybe if we set up our own "faceless justice committee" who could do their job without fearing their children, or grandchildren, would be slaughtered on the way to school for doing so. Who look to Mexico where 44 students have disappeared not long ago and no one is doing anything about this either they've lost so much control after having Pablo Escobar sitting in their Congress.

Only modern surveillance technology has created the environment where what worked in the 1990's for Columbia won't work in a day and age where our phones are the same as tracking and surveillance devices.

So what is a solution here to a train that's gone off the rails to bring things back on track? I prayed for insight and believe it or not - I looked up and was watching an old Billy Jack movie. I couldn't believe what I was seeing - absolutely everything I'm seeing now was in this 1970's movie which he wrote and directed to show the corruption behind a nuclear plant being built where he was wanting to instead build a youth center to help troubled kids.

In this film, he was talking about a "national referendum" was the solution. I had no idea what this was and in fact don't remember anyone in this country, not even Obama, saying this term. I'd like to know more about it so I looked up Tom Laughlin's contact information just now - only to find out he's passed.

So I'm going to hope this reaches some survivors over there who would be willing to talk to me more about this subject. I was a kid when this film came out and all I remember about Billy Jack was the martial arts, the cool song, and the way he reminded me of an American "Kung Fu" version of David Carradine. But clearly the man was ahead of his time. I could see that when reading how he had to book his films into theaters himself at first.

Tom was clearly ahead of his time. But for now - he's "right on time" with this idea. Please get in touch with me so I can learn more about what a "national referendum" is. Building nuclear plants is one thing - but when we've reached the point where our children are being trafficked and there's nothing that can be done to stop it, to where when their plight comes out to the light THEY'RE the ones arrested, held on a $300,000 bail, and having their face plastered all over the media INSTEAD of the men who preyed upon her, and her family, as well as many others, then we need to do something different.

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About Me

I've been helping men and women leave the sex industry since 1987. Some were forced - some were not. Some thought they weren't and with time realized they were. Some thought they were and with time realized they weren't. Which is why I just focus on this - if you want help to leave any part of the sex industry for any reason - just get in touch. I run Sex Workers Anonymous, Trafficking & Prostitution Services, as well as the American Trafficking Institute. I produce www.blogtalkradio.com/stopsextrafficktalk, and the magazine "Sanity Today". I also help investigators and the authorities with sex trafficking cases, and families help their loved ones leave the streets. Currently I'm organizing www.boycottsnoop.com to demand an acknowledgment of the damage that was done to women during his 2003 tour and www.pimpalert.com to help caught pimps who are dangerous and on the streets. Our book on the history of this field "Anatomy of a Movement" is almost done.